


The Nightmare Club

by redjacket



Series: The Nightmare Club [1]
Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: M/M, Team as Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-28
Updated: 2020-08-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:39:50
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,991
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26163523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/redjacket/pseuds/redjacket
Summary: “Do you play cards?” Nicky asked."Yes?”“Good. There is a deck inside.”“You want to play cards,” Nile said, in the toneless, disbelieving way that her mother had always hated.Nicky smiled: “Booker called it the Nightmare Club."
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Series: The Nightmare Club [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1899955
Comments: 57
Kudos: 470





	1. Chapter 1

There were a few things that Nile figured out about her new companions quickly. 

Andy had an incredible sweet tooth, which Nicky liked to indulge. 

Nicky and Joe moved around each other in the kitchen like they were dancing, more in sync, even, then when they fought together. They didn’t cook together every night but when they did the kitchen felt warm and full of laughter and whatever ended up on the table was mouth wateringly delicious. 

Joe liked to read poetry in the language it was written in, particularly if Nicky was laying with his head in Joe’s lap when he did, their fingers loosely linked together.

Andy couldn’t go three days without tussling with one of them playfully. She loved teaching Nile to use her axe, Nicky’s sword, Joe’s scimitar, plus knives, and moves Nile couldn’t have imagined and she once even pulled out a grenade launcher from a shed and asked Nile if she needed a lesson. She fought with Nicky and Joe too, wrestling them to the ground and refusing to let them be gentle with her.

Nicky liked to bake; Joe didn’t. Andy only went into the kitchen to steal pastry filling, never any kind of dough and absolutely never to cook. 

They once stayed at a safe house on a lake and Nicky and  _ Andy _ inexplicably left before dawn to go fishing every single morning - Joe had laughed at them but also somehow prepared it differently enough each day that Nile hadn’t been sick of it when they left a week later. 

They all moved awkwardly around an empty space that Nile quickly caught on was meant for Booker; they never expected her to fill it, frowned and steered her away the few times she tried. 

Andy sometimes disappeared for days. Joe never left but he got quiet and a little moody so that only Nicky could coax laughter from him. Nicky had nightmares. 

Somehow that last one surprised Nile. 

It wasn’t every night. And he was quiet about it. Nile didn’t think she would have even noticed if she wasn’t having nightmares herself. 

It wasn’t every night for her either. It was just...sometimes the things she did, even before the missions started, sometimes it caught up with her. 

And there was always Quynh, drowning in the darkness, haunting her dreams when she least expected it - or that was what it felt like. 

She didn’t know if Andy or Joe had nightmares. Even after she became mortal, Andy’s sleep patterns weren’t exactly normal. If they were on the move, she literally always slept when someone else was driving and she wasn’t on watch but when they were stationary she was the last one up at night and the first one awake in the morning. And even though Nile would have assumed Nicky and Joe got first dibs on private rooms, they always left them to Andy. 

And Joe. As far as Nile could tell, Joe slept like the dead. Even when they were in cars or trains, he wrapped himself around Nicky like an octopus and was out like a light - she had watched Nicky navigate for Andy from the back seat with a goddamn map while Joe was completely conked out and curled around him. If there was a bed, it was always the same - Joe was the big spoon, plastered against Nicky’s back, not an inch between them. 

She would have thought Nicky was the same, though. It was only because she had already jerked awake, quietly this time, sitting up in bed but not gasping, that she saw Nicky shuddering awake himself. 

It started slowly. Nile was pretty sure she missed the first few minutes of it. Nicky didn’t move around the way she did - Joe’s arms would have made that hard. It was all in his face and arms. She first looked over because she heard him gasp, quiet and...scared. His brow was furrowed and then he flinched. His mouth opened, moving as if forming silent words. His hands started to twitch and his head jerked back as if he was trying to move away from something. Nile could see the muscles in his arms tensing, see a line of tension in his neck. 

His whole body went rigid as his eyes flew open with a barely audibly gasp. His fingers clenched, pressing hard into Joe’s arms, which were still holding him tightly. He was breathing heavily, his eyes wide and staring in the dark. 

Joe didn’t wake but he snuffled closer to Nicky and started rubbing clumsy circles over his chest and stomach. They had been at this so long, apparently, that Joe could soothe Nicky even in his sleep. 

And it worked. Nicky seemed to almost strain against Joe’s hold for a moment as Joe curled closer around his back, his hand still splayed and rubbing slowly against Nicky’s chest, until Nicky closed his eyes for a moment. He opened them again, and started taking long, slow breaths, shaky at first but then evening out until his body started to relax. 

Nile waited it out until she was pretty sure he was asleep again before trying to tiptoe out of the room. 

Nicky’s eyes snapped open before her feet had even hit the floor because  _ of course _ . She could tell his hand flexed on the gun he kept under his damn pillow but at least he didn’t pull it out at her. 

She winced, mouthed ‘I’m sorry,’ and slipped out of the room before she could disturb him any more. She headed out to the balcony overlooking the parking lot of the hotel they were staying in. 

It didn’t really surprise her when Nicky opened the balcony door near silently and came to stand beside her. 

“Sorry for waking you,” Nile said again. 

Nicky nodded. Nile liked that about him. He didn’t ever make her feel guilty but he didn’t just dismiss her either. 

He leaned a bit closer so that she could feel his body heat even though they weren’t touching. Nile knew if she leaned back towards him, he would put an arm around her shoulders; if she turned to him, he would wrap her in his arms. 

“Do you want to tell me?” He asked. She had snapped at them once, after waking the whole damn room up, when he just said: “Tell us,” and since then he had always made sure to ask. 

“You know my friend was with me, when it happened. The first time I died,” Nile said, explaining what he already knew. “And after she kind of...”

“Turned on you,” Nicky said. 

“Changed,” Nile said. 

Nicky said nothing and there was no judgment in his gaze. He just waited and did that thing where he didn’t look away from her, gave her his full attention. It was creepy but it made her feel...safe or valued or something too. 

“Yeah, okay,” Nile said, swallowing. “She turned on me. She didn’t  _ do _ anything, but she...she, she almost shunned me, I guess. Got the others to as well. I wasn’t there long enough for anything to really happen, they just...”

_ Packed her bags, _ Nile thought.  _ Who knows what they said about her. They had been her squad, her family, Dizzy had met her mom.  _

Nicky slouched to one side so that his shoulder bumped against hers. As if the man didn’t have the most upright posture of anyone she had ever seen except maybe Andy when she was walking into a battle like a marble goddess brought to life. 

“Sometimes I dream about the way I died the first time and the man I killed, you know?” Nile said. “But sometimes it’s Dizzy slitting my throat. Sometimes it’s me....” 

Her mouth went dry but she forced herself to say it. “Sometimes she’s the one I kill.” 

Nicky made a sympathetic noise. Nile looked at him. The lines on his face looked harsher than they were because of the orange light flickering over the parking lot. It made her lean a little closer, checking to make sure his softness was still there. 

But then she looked away from him because she didn’t want to see his face change. 

“It’s bad enough dreaming about the guy I killed, about dying,” Nile said, looking down at her own hands. “My own damn brain has to go and make things worse?” 

There was a pause and then Nicky slowly covered one of her hands with his own and said: “I used to have nightmares about killing Joe.”

Nile jerked her head up to look at him then. It didn’t surprise her, not really, she had sat through enough lectures and well meaning talks and  _ therapy  _ on trauma after her dad died and then once she joined the Marines. 

It did kind of surprise her that he admitted it so easily. 

But Nicky’s face was calm and when he saw that she was looking back at him, he just gave her a small, kind smile. “It has been a long time since that happened. Joe is...”

He paused, weighing his words. Joe could wax poetic about Nicky at the literal drop of a hat. She had actually seen him do it once. Nicky...Nile thought Nicky might not always have words for the enormity of what he felt for Joe. Or, at least, only simple ones. 

(Her mom would have said there was poetry in that, too, Nile knew.)

“Joe, what he has become to me, is such a constant,” Nicky said, he shook his head, still smiling. “He is the love of my life and he is the man who comforts me in his sleep. I do not have nightmares about killing him anymore. But I did, in the beginning.”

Nile swallowed. She knew she would never make peace with Dizzy or Jay or any of them. It didn’t hurt as much as knowing she would never see her mom or brother again but it still hurt. She wondered how long it would take her to make peace with it enough that she would stop dreaming about it. 

“Other things replaced those dreams,” Nicky said, nudging her shoulder with his. “And I have found...hm.”

Nile waited, watching him, as he thought about his words. Sometimes, Nicky made halfway mystical pronouncements that literally made bad guys shiver and sometimes he cursed at Joe in a tangled mash of old-ass Italian and Arabic that made no sense even to  _ Joe  _ but in general, he was fairly plain in his speech. But when he thought it was important, he took time with his words. 

“A wound like this, in your heart, it often festers into another. Until it is hard for our minds to see a difference between the two,” Nicky said. “It is not fair but there is no shame in it and,” he squeezed her hand, “it is okay to grieve that with all your other losses.”

Nile knew something at once. “You speak from experience.”

“I do.”

“It gets easier, right?” Nile asked, resignedly, echoing what she had been told since she was 12 and her aunt had to tell her her dad wasn’t coming back because her mom couldn’t do it. She hadn’t really believed it then, either. 

“Yes and no,” Nicky said. Nile stared at him but Nicky only shrugged and told her, honestly. “I find it comes in waves. Yes, some things fade. But sometimes that does not mean they disappear completely.”

He sighed and looked at her with a touch of regret. “And with what we do, if you are like me and prone to such things, there will always be new nightmares to take their place.”

Nile stared at Nicky for a moment. She liked that he was honest with her but these people  _ really  _ didn’t believe in sugar coating anything. 

“Wow, and I thought Andy was bad at the sales pitch for this lifestyle,” Nile said flatly. She appreciated it though. It didn’t make things any easier but at least she wouldn’t feel the dull burn of disappointment in the pit of her stomach when she realized that herself. 

It made Nicky snort. “We should really send Joe.” 

“Yes!” Nile said. “Your PR strategy is terrible.”

“We are consistent with it, at least,” Nicky said, which made him chuckle and Nile didn’t really understand. Maybe she would one day or maybe you had to be there. 

They stood there in silence for a while. Nile didn’t really want to try to go back to sleep, a little bit for fear that the nightmare would come back but more because she was so awake now. She had never been good at staring at the ceiling and trying to sleep. For all that he had settled again, under Joe’s touch, Nicky did not seem eager to return to bed either.

It made her wonder what he had dreamed about. As soon as the thought crossed her mind, she wanted to know, suddenly, desperately, what had Nicky shuddering awake in the middle of the night. So, she asked.

Nicky looked at her, gently, evenly, and shook his head. 

“It would only add to your nightmares,” he told her. 

Nile didn’t know what to say to that. Part of her wanted to scoff and roll her eyes at him, tell him not to treat her like a kid. A larger part of her knew that he was being utterly sincere and that whatever still gave  _ him _ nightmares after a thousand years just might.

But Nicky didn’t seem to need a response. He broke the stillness between them, stretching his arms out in front of him and considered her with a much more practical gaze. 

“Do you play cards?” He asked. 

Nile blinked. “Yes?” 

Nicky nodded. “Good. There is a deck inside.”

“You want to play cards,” Nile said, in the toneless, disbelieving way that her mother had always hated. 

“It is rare that we don’t have a deck of cards handy,” Nicky explained. He ducked his head a little. “It is something to do.” 

Nile didn’t have a leg to stand on since she had woken up from nightmares three times in the last week. She still said: “It happens that often huh?” 

Nicky's mouth curved up a little more. “Booker called it the Nightmare Club. I think he was joking but,” Nicky shrugged, “it stuck.” 

Nile had to laugh. “Again, that sounds like the  _ worst club  _ in the world.” 

But as she followed Nicky inside, an ache she didn’t know she had been carrying in her chest eased. 

“You have not been decapitated yet,” Nicky said, blandly. He turned to glance at Nile and she was pretty sure it was just so she could see the amused glint in his eye. 

“ _ Again _ ,” Nile said but she was smiling as they sat down in the little alcove they had called a sitting room in the tiny suite Copley booked for them.

Nicky produced a deck of cards. Nile dealt for rummy because playing war or slapjack with a thousand year old man seemed absurd. Which meant she wanted to play it when there weren’t two other people sleeping nearby. 

Nile asked Nicky questions as they played - light ones, or the weird ones she had, because Nicky always answered her questions, even if she didn’t always understand his answers. She just...wasn’t up for anything heavy at the moment. And he answered, but as they played a few more hands, he got quieter. He wasn’t  _ not  _ talking to her but there was suddenly a distance to him and Nile didn’t know what had happened or what to do about it. 

She was dealing again and thinking about calling him on it, or maybe just suggesting they go back to bed, maybe he was actually just tired, when Nicky sat up a little straighter, as if he had come to a decision about something. 

“One moment, Nile, please,” he said, suddenly very present again. “Can you pass me the laptop?”

Nile stared. She did that sometimes, when, for example, Andy brought out the grenade launcher (or the one time she decided she wanted to bake a cake and shooed them all out of the kitchen and it turned out perfect but like nothing Nile had ever tasted before) or Joe stood on a table in a bar and turned out to able to recite her favourite Dr. Seuss book from memory (“Did you know him?” Nile had asked, eagerly, and Joe had just laughed and launched into another tale) or she caught Nicky arguing with, like, Doris Kearns Goodwin on a closed Facebook group for historians (“He never did finish that PhD,” Joe told her. “Eh, Nicolo stop, we burned those documents, remember? She couldn’t know she’s wrong.”).

And maybe this wasn’t quite as dramatic but it still seemed weirdly out of character. 

He only took a moment to pluck at the keys though - Nile thought he was sending an email, which, okay, maybe there was something important about the mission they had just completed that he forgot to tell Copley about - before setting it aside. Literally, put it on the other half of the not-quite-a-loveseat he was sitting on.

He took the cards Nile had given him, smiling and saying: “Grazie,” as they started again. But he seemed more settled and back with her so Nile played - and won - the next couple of hands. Nicky, she realized, wasn’t particularly good at rummy. 

It was on the tip of her tongue to ask about betting when she remembered he was  _ a thousand years old  _ and probably a card shark who was just waiting for her to ask. 

Instead, she asked him a question about how card games had changed - he looked confused, so maybe he really was just bad at them - when the computer dinged. Nicky, like everyone over 50, never turned electronics to  _ silent _ . 

Nicky turned just enough to read it, frowning. Nile might have peeked over his shoulder. She couldn’t read it but she could tell it was just one line, just a couple words. 

Nicky, though, stayed very still for a few seconds. Nile recognized that and tensed a little. It usually meant something incredibly violent was about to happen. 

“Do you know how to make a call on one of these?” Nicky asked, instead. “With a picture?” 

“Like, a photo?” Nile asked. “Do you have Skype?”

“Like a video,” Nicky clarified. “Is Skype secure?”

“I mean, it’s encrypted,” Nile said. 

He handed her his computer. He did not have Skype. Nile sighed. He and Joe were better than Andy but all of them were way worse than even her grandma when it came to tech. 

“If it can be traced we should not call,” Nicky told her. He sounded regretful about it but also like he wasn’t going to budge. 

Luckily, Nile knew what she was doing. “I got you. Who are we calling anyway?”

“Booker.”

Nile froze. She stared at him. Nicky met her gaze squarely, as if he could not imagine why she was pausing.

“Booker,” Nile repeated. “Really?”

Nicky had been the one to suggest the 100 year exile. Granted, Joe had wanted more - an exile the same length that Booker had lived so far - and Andy had never given a firm number. Nile had gotten the feeling in the bar, though, that whatever number Nicky said would stick as Booker’s sentence.

“He is awake,” Nicky said. 

“Won’t Joe get mad?” Nile asked.

Nicky dipped his head. “He might. But if he does, it will be with me.”

Nile wasn’t going to say no, if that was a risk Nicky wanted to take. He didn’t seem like he was worried about it. 

Booker answered before the end of the first ring. He looked absolutely panicked. 

“What’s wrong?” He asked immediately. “What happened?”

“Booker, it’s okay. We’re all fine.  _ Andy  _ is fine,” Nicky said, immediately soothing. “Nothing is wrong. I am sorry to have worried you.”

It wasn’t the greatest connection. Booker wasn’t HD sharp or anything. Nile could still tell he was looking at Nicky like he had two heads. 

“Why are-why are you calling then?” Booker asked and his voice was as small as Nile had ever heard it. 

Nicky winced. He had pretty clearly not meant to cause Booker this much distress. 

“We’re playing cards,” Nicky told him, voice gentle. “Nile had a nightmare.”

“Nicky had a nightmare,” Nile interjected. She wasn’t going to let them pin this all on her. Nicky looked entirely unruffled by the interjection. 

“Oh,” Booker said. He looked a bit stunned. “Nightmare club.” 

“You are still a member,” Nicky told him firmly. “If you would like.” 

“Are you sure that’s allowed?” Booker said, bitterness in his voice.

“If it is not, it will be my cross to bear,” Nicky said, serenely. 

Nile cut him a look. She hadn’t quite pinned down Nicky’s deal yet when it came to religion and she couldn’t tell if he was mocking her religion. 

But it made Booker laugh. He didn’t look like he wanted to entirely but it broke the tension. 

“All right,” he said. “What are we playing?”

“Not rummy,” Nile said. 

“Oh Nile,” Booker said. “Nicky’s not any better at anything else.”

“I am adequate at poker,” Nicky defended. He was also, Nile noted, good at shuffling the cards, he kept doing little tricks without calling attention to them.

“You are adequate at strip poker,” Booker returned. “Because you cheat so you and-and Joe can get naked faster.”

“It is only cheating if you get caught,” Nicky said. He did not mention the way Booker tripped over Joe’s name. 

“You guys get caught  _ every  _ time.”

“What about Asshole?” Nile said. “Do you guys know Asshole?” 

There was a beat of silence. Then Booker groaned and Nicky smiled at her wolfishly. 

Nile rolled her eyes. She had learned to play Asshole in high school. She guessed it was only fair that they were going to be  _ like that. _

“It’s also called President if you’re not cool,” Nile told them before explaining the rules.

She only got halfway through before they were both nodding and Nicky said: “Like daifugō, yes.” 

It took them awhile to figure out how to play with the cards in their safehouse and Booker decidedly not. Nicky just looked at her blankly when she suggested downloading an app on their phones and then actually curled his lip in disgust when he understood what she was suggesting. Booker axed the website she found as being unsecured. Finally, Nicky just held Booker’s cards in front of the screen so he could see them, which Nile protested was  _ totally  _ cheating until it became clear that Nicky was actually inadvertently hindering Booker. 

It was...it was nice. Nicky and Booker hadn’t said anything to each other specifically but they had obviously both decided to  _ not talk about it _ and keep things light. Nile asked them a bunch of really ridiculous questions that Nicky answered straight-faced and Booker gave him shit for, a little hesitantly, maybe, but he still  _ did _ . 

(“So is this a thing you all do?” Nile asked. “Is Joe going to join us next week or...?”

Nicky straight up laughed. “No. Joe, he-I have never before or since met such a heavy sleeper. Except when it is another one of us, if he dreams at all, he does not recall it.” 

“Slept through a bomb going off outside our safe house once,” Booker said. “He doesn’t twitch unless Nicky does.” 

“He had been up for four days straight that time,” Nicky defended lightly though he did not disagree. 

“What about Andy?” Nile asked.

Nicky hummed, frowning at his cards. “Andy is not part of the Nightmare Club, no. She has her own club. The I-Do-Not-Think-I-Need-To-Sleep-More-Than-Two-Hours-A-Day Club.”

Booker smiled, as grim as he was amused: “Sometimes we have joint meetings. Play the middle card. No, the other one.”

“If it involves booze it is a social not a meeting,” Nicky pronounced. He frowned at Booker’s card now. “Are you sure it was this one? I do not think this is your best move.”

“Cheating!” 

“Just play the card, Nicky!”)

And it was funny how bad Nicky was at cards. He had the  _ worst  _ luck and on top of that he kept mixing up the rules with some other game. 

Eventually, Nile settled onto the couch beside him because someone needed to help him out. She didn’t quite know when she started leaning against him. Didn’t quite know when she started to yawn. Eventually, after a string of absurdly bad hands, Nicky decided he needed to give the cards an extra long shuffle and by the time he was done Nile was mostly asleep. She could hear the whisper of the cards against each other but Nicky didn’t seem to mind and he was comfortable. 

“She talk to you about it?” Booker asked quietly. 

Nile thought vaguely about opening her eyes, letting them know she wasn’t quite asleep yet, that she could still hear them, but her eyelids felt so heavy and she couldn’t muster the energy to open them. 

“A little,” Nicky replied.

He shifted and Nile almost said something, almost got up to go back to her own bed but then Nicky was slipping a thin pillow under her head and draping something warm over her that smelled...it smelled like Andy. She didn’t want to move. She curled closer to him, clutching the makeshift blanket he had found for her. 

“I don’t need to tell you she might need that,” Booker said, longing in his voice.

“You don’t,” Nicky said. His hand touched her head gently and he stroked his thumb over her forehead, like a benediction.

“Did she-” Booker cleared his throat. “Did she ask? About yours? Do you-” Booker hesitated again. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“She is too young for it,” Nicky said. He sounded so serious that it almost made Nile frown. It would be cruel.” 

“That bad, huh?” Booker said. His voice was so quiet. 

Nicky only said: “Yes.” 

There was a long stretch of silence without even the sound of the shuffling cards. Nile was dropping off when Booker asked, in a low, pained voice. 

“Nicky. Is it...?”

“Yes.” 

Booker exhaled, like all the air was leaving his body at once. “Still?”

“Yes,” Nicky said again. His thumb stilled on Nile’s forehead and his hand fell away. She felt him sigh. “Less now than at the beginning. But yes.” 

Booker made a sound like a laugh but was far, far from it. 

“I have seen you tear your wrists and hands to pieces to escape capture,” Booker said. “I’ve seen you break your bones to do it. Andy said you cut off your own hand once. Why didn’t you when-?” 

“Only when escape is clear to me. Not blindly,” Nicky said. His voice was infinitely gentle but he still said it. “And I could not without a way to free Joe as well. And then Andy and you. I could not escape alone and leave you there.”

“Nicky-” Booker said, sounding broken. 

He didn’t say anything more. 

Nicky broke the silence, his voice a little too casual. “So, how do we play cards on this thing? Can you find us a site that won’t do whatever it is you fear it will?” 

“You don’t have to-” Booker began. 

“I am not going to sleep tonight,” Nicky interrupted. “Are you?”

“No,” Booker answered. 

“Well then,” Nicky said. “What shall we play?” 

Nile heard Nicky poking at the computer again. Then she was asleep. 

* * *

When Nile woke up it was to dishes clinking together and a voice, distantly, shushing someone. She recognized the exaggerated not-quiet of trying not to wake someone. For a moment she was intensely homesick, even for that terrible time when she and her brother had tiptoed around because their mom was finally asleep. She hadn’t slept much after her dad died. Not for a long time.

She blinked it back. Her neck was sore and her legs were cramped but she was covered by something warm that smelled like Andy - her coat, Nile put together quickly - and an arm lay heavily over her shoulder, stretching down her arm. Nicky’s fingers drifted slowly back and forth and Nile wondered if she had moved while waking up somehow or if Nicky was just  _ like that _ and offered comfort without even realizing it. 

Her head was still on his thigh and he had stayed like that all night, probably so he wouldn’t wake her, so Nile guessed it was the latter. 

“Good morning,” he said quietly.

Still too observant by half though. 

Nile opened her eyes and started to pick herself up, bracing for a crick in her neck all day and cramps in her calves and...Nicky steadied her for a moment as she realized no, as soon as she sat up every ache she should have had was gone. She looked at him - the laptop was gone, someone had brought him a book and Nile wondered how long he had been reading, waiting for her to wake up - and he smiled at her as if he knew exactly what she had just experienced. 

“We should put that in the brochure,” Nicky said. Nile stared at him. “For the PR.”

Nile was so startled she laughed. Then covered her mouth to stifle it. Then she let herself laugh. 

Nicky grinned - he smiled like that, big and open, more than Nile would have thought at first - and put his book to the side. He looked at Nile, considering, and then opened his arms. It was strangely casual though. He wasn’t telling her she needed a hug but he was inviting the possibility. 

Nile took it. Nicky gave unfairly great hugs. Him and Joe both. 

“Did you sleep well?” Nicky asked, his hand gentle against the back of her head as she pressed her cheek against his shoulder. 

“Yeah. You didn’t have to stay,” Nile told him.

“Ah,” Nicky said as if it were nothing. “I didn’t want to wake you.”

Nile closed her eyes. It was a good feeling knowing how deeply they had come to care about her. It would have sucked if what she felt hadn’t been returned. 

“Thanks,” she whispered, instead of saying any of that. 

“Prego Nile,” he said, then, pitching his voice louder. “This does mean, though, that Joe has been in the kitchen by himself.” 

“I made pancakes!” Joe called, cheerfully, so Nile was surprised when Nicky let go of her and muttered several curses under his breath. 

“What kind of pancakes?” Nicky called back. 

“American ones,” Joe replied. “For Nile!”

Nicky closed his eyes as if pained. “And what did you add to them?” 

Joe appeared out of the kitchen doorway. There was batter in his beard and somehow also in his hair. “Blueberries. Cinnamon.”

Nicky looked suspicious. “Only?”

“Yes, only. I used the box kind,” Joe said. He was beginning to look affronted. 

Nicky still looked deeply suspicious. Nile looked from him to Joe and asked, bewildered: “What could you have done to  _ pancakes _ ?” 

Joe pointed his spatula at Nicky. The way he flicked at them sent more batter into his hair. “Love of my life, heart of my heart, do not start slandering me to Nile now.” 

“They were  _ that  _ bad?!” 

“No, no,” Nicky said, momentarily reassuring. Then he ruined it. “Only, Joe can be inventive and some recipes, they should not be...mixed. Especially not with  _ that  _ combination of spices.” 

Joe looked so utterly betrayed - and Nile knew it was for effect, knew the reason they were doing this was for her, so it wouldn’t be awkward but still - she had to laugh. 

“You exaggerate. They were not that bad.  _ You  _ ate them,” Joe responded.

“I will always eat your pancakes, my love,” Nicky said with utter sincerity. “But...as we could not coax the stray cats to do so...”

Joe made an outraged noise. Nicky looked completely nonplussed. They seemed at something of an impasse. 

“If I don’t have a pancake on my plate in five minutes I’m going to shoot one of you,” Andy yelled from the kitchen. And then, to make Joe and Nicky really go pale, added: “Or cook them myself.” 

Joe was back in the kitchen like a shot, Nicky following tightly on his heels, looking more like they were going into battle than to fix breakfast. She could hear Andy heckling them in what sounded like Italian but wasn’t quite and Joe responding in kind.

She took the time to fold Andy’s coat over the back of the chair. She noticed the laptop tucked away back on the bottom shelf of the side table as she did and frowned. She vaguely remembered hearing Nicky and Booker’s voices as she fell asleep. She wondered how long they had spoken, if either of them had hung up as soon as she wasn’t actively participating anymore or if they had continued playing and whether or not it had done them any good. 

“There’s coffee, Nile!” Joe called from the kitchen. “Come get something before Nicky drinks it all.” 

Nicky told him off, loudly. Nile had learned just enough Italian to understand what he said. She huffed a laugh and went to join her family for breakfast. 


	2. Coda

Andy took charge of Nile after breakfast. They were heading to a safe house for the next few days to give Copley time to cover their tracks. Joe and Nicky would put Nile through her paces after they arrived - one day Joe knew she would be able to defeat the two of them together, as Andy could - but for the morning she and Andy were working on her languages. Andy was building on her decent grasp of Spanish, less-practiced French and introducing some more Italian - Nicky objected to Andy being her teacher for  _ that  _ but even Joe knew he was too prone to anachronisms to be an effective teacher. 

Andy had taken Nile to a cafe; they would leave for the safe house together from there. Joe and Nicky, the only ones who had technically checked in, would pack up their few things and meet them there.

It wasn’t necessary to split up to travel, they were not being hunted, but it was more comfortable to take a car when they had several nondescript suitcases full of surveillance equipment, tactical gear and weaponry. 

This last job had been the most complicated they had taken since Nile had joined them. Since Andy’s mortality. 

Since Booker’s exile. 

Joe thought Nile was a wonder. He thought one day she would be the best of them all and they already moved as one, far more so than when Booker first joined them or when Nicky and Joe joined forces with Andy and Quynh. But for all her confidence and bravery and skill, she was still so young. None of them wanted her to lose that too soon.

And...she was not Booker. It was not the specific skills either of them brought. (Nile was precise and disciplined; Booker was a brawler. Booker was a forger and could weave layers of bullshit on paper or in person that would confound anyone; Nile cut through other people’s bullshit like a well-sharpened knife. Nile adapted, code-switched; Booker charmed. For all her doubts and questions and newness, Nile at her core was steady, had a foundation driven deep and solid into the earth; Booker had always felt like the ground beneath him was unsteady.) 

Nile’s presence, appreciated as it was, was her own; she did not fill the place of his brother. They did not  _ want  _ her to. 

Joe missed him. Joe did not know what to do with the anger he still felt towards him, the exhaustion it left in its wake. Joe loved Booker. His heart bled for him. He wanted his brother to be well and happy. 

He also thought he still might hate him. For now. 

Andy knew that as well as Joe did - they had known each other too long and far too well. He and Nicky were a balm for each other and Joe needed that right now. Despite Andy’s feeling of renewed purpose, despite her mortality, she still saw what he needed and carved out the space for it. Joe loved her for it and for an uncountable number of reasons more. 

So, Andy and Nile would be taking the train and Andy would point out all the ways to ride it unseen, though Nicky had gotten Andy to promise she would not demonstrate how to get up onto the roof or hook onto the under carriage. When they next had the luxury of time in their travel, Joe or Nicky would take Nile to practice. For now, though, they had time alone in the hotel, time together in the car and would arrive a few hours before Andy and Nile arrived at the station. 

Joe was looking forward to every minute of it. 

Nicky was still Nicky. Joe had to be swift or Nicky would check and stow all their weapons and have the place wiped down before anyone could help him. It was simply what Nicky did. 

Joe disliked letting him do it all on his own, though. He wiped away any trace of them that could have been left room by room until Nicky had everything neatly stowed and they only had to wipe down the door. It surprised Joe when Nicky pulled him into the tiny sitting room, took his hand, brought it to his lips and kissed his knuckles tenderly. 

“I called Booker last night,” Nicky told him. “On the computer.”

Joe froze for a moment, frowning. He felt the spark of anger at Booker’s name but it was Nicky bringing this to him, so mostly the thought of their brother only made him feel tired. Nicky was clearly waiting, in case the anger in him won today and he needed to get it out. When he said nothing, Nicky continued.

“Nile had a nightmare,” Nicky continued. “I followed her when she got up.”

“Ah,” Joe said, understanding at once. “Nightmare club?”

Nicky nodded. He did not have to say that he, too, had had a nightmare. Joe always knew, even if he did not wake for all of them. It had not been so bad, by Nicky’s standards, if Joe hadn’t woken up. 

“I emailed Booker to see if he was awake too,” Nicky shrugged. “It felt right.”

That was the crux of the matter, then. Plenty of things felt  _ wrong  _ without Booker there beside them but the thought of having him there felt wrong too. Not always worse than it felt without him but still wrong. Nothing could be healed until Joe and Nicky, and Andy too, could let go of that. 

If this connection felt right to Nicky, who had as much reason as anyone to shy away from Booker’s presence...Joe could live with that. 

It still made him feel tired. He sighed and rubbed his hands over his mouth. When he dropped his hands to his side again, Nicky caught one and kissed the centre of his palm. Joe slid it along Nicky’s jaw and cupped his cheek. 

“I don’t want him to be able to figure out where we are,” Joe said. He did not hide the hurt he felt at having to say it. 

Nicky looked around the room, as nondescript as a modest hotel suite could be. There would be, Joe knew, exact copies of it all over the world and they were leaving today. Some tension eased in his spine even before Nicky looked back at him. 

“We will put a sheet up when we’re in a place he would recognize,” Nicky told him. 

“He can’t track the connection?” Joe asked. 

“Nile set up the call. She said he could not,” Nicky told him. Then amended. “She said he could not easily.”

“Hm,” Joe thought about that. 

“I can ask Copley to make it more secure,” Nicky said. 

Joe...did not think Booker would try to find him. He thought anyone using Booker to find them would likely try to go through Copley too. Still, he hesitated. He remembered Nicky’s controlled calm and his targeted rage, whenever the moment came to unleash it. Nicky did not often allow himself to be angry. He thought about the root of Nicky’s nightmares, the ones that had returned since Merrick and Booker’s betrayal. He thought about how long it had taken him to heal, to shake off the long-lingering remnants of what had been done to him. How the nightmares still remained with him, after centuries, a last vestige that clung to him like a burr. 

“I trust Nile,” Joe said. He winced. “I do not think Booker would intentionally betray us  _ again _ but I do not think I should trust that.”

Nicky was already nodding. “And Booker could do so unintentionally as well, I fear. I will get Copley to secure something for us.”

“Beyond what is reasonable,” Joe said. It made Nicky smile. It was always so easy for Joe to kiss that smile. There was heat there, there always was, and Joe had to pull himself back from chasing it. 

He almost didn’t ask because he wanted to kiss Nicky as much as his Nicolo clearly wanted to kiss him. He needed to check in with him, too, because he suspected Nicky would not have unburdened himself last night, not to Nile for sure, and he doubted to Booker either. He knew, though, if he did not ask this question now, he wouldn’t. He would pack it away and not think of his brother until he had to and he found he wanted to know. 

“How is he doing?” Joe asked. 

“Poorly,” Nicky said, with a sigh. Joe smiled grimly, his love had never been one to pull his punches. “I wish I could say otherwise. If anything, he is doing more poorly than before.”

Joe winced, though he had suspected as much. “I just can’t...”

“I know,” Nicky said. “Neither can I. Neither can Andy, yet, I don’t think.”

“You’ve already forgiven him, my heart,” Joe said, kindly, wonderingly. It went without saying that he did not. 

“I forgive him. I love him,” Nicky agreed. “But I can’t give him my trust, not yet.”

Joe closed the small space between them to kiss Nicky then. He knew, for all of Nicky’s forgiveness and love, for as big as his heart was, he would likely be the last to truly trust Booker again and  _ that  _ would likely be long after they invited him back to break bread with them. Joe would feel for  _ Booker _ when that happened - Nicky’s wariness left a person feeling very cold. 

Joe was the opposite, he already  _ mostly  _ trusted that Booker would not betray them again.

His forgiveness, for what he had done to them and to himself, would take longer.

“I can’t forgive him yet,” Joe confessed as he had before. 

Nicky nodded, his fingers scratching lightly at the back of Joe’s neck. He could let it sooth him or inflame him. Nicky could do both so easily.

“I know, my love,” Nicky said. 

Joe leaned forward to kiss him again and Nicky was already there to meet him. It was always so between them. Nicky understood Joe as Joe understood him. Whenever one of them reached out the other was already leaning towards them. 

“Do you want to talk about your nightmare?” Joe asked softly, when they parted, sliding his hands up and down Nicky’s back to soothe. “I know you did not with Nile.”

“No,” Nicky sighed. “I imagine I will have to one day. But...”

“She is very young,” Joe agreed. 

“I think it would give her new nightmares,” Nicky confessed and Joe’s heart panged. 

“You can always wake me,” Joe told him. Had told him more times than he could count. And Nicky did when he needed to. 

“You did a fine job of comforting me without waking,” Nicky teased. His hands curled lightly in Joe’s shirt and Joe stepped a little closer. They still had time. They could clean the bedroom again. “I would have gone back to sleep if Nile hadn’t gotten up.” 

Nicky settled one hand against Joe’s face. His thumb running over his beard and then his lips. His eyes were soft and always so very blue and they looked at Joe as if they could see the very soul of him. Nicky always felt so  _ present  _ to Joe. 

“You wake when they are bad,” Nicky told him. “You  _ know _ .”

In this one thing, Joe was less poetic than his love. Nicky thrashed when they were bad. It would have woken anyone in the room, let alone the man who slept with his arms so tight around him. 

But that was a disagreement they had had before and Nicky’s faith in Joe was unwavering. He didn’t care to have it again. Particularly not when Nicky was looking at him  _ like that. _

“Do you want to talk about it?” Joe repeated since Nicky had not truly answered. It would be unlike Nicky to shy away from something bothering him but it had happened before.

Nicky, only shrugged though. “It was what it has been since Merrick. No better or worse.”

“They don’t touch you the way they used to,” Joe observed.

Nicky smiled again. “And who do I have to thank for that?”

Joe brought Nicky’s fingers to his lips. They had always helped heal each other from the wounds that lingered in ways other than physical.

“Yourself, mostly, I think,” Joe told him, truly.

Nicky rolled his eyes at Joe. “False modesty does not suit you.” 

“No more than it suits you,” Joe told him. Nicky gave him a look, he always did, and Joe always reminded him, this time chasing his lips and pressing kisses to them between words. “Do not deny your own strength, my heart.”

“I would be nowhere without your patience and kindness, my beloved,” Nicky replied and when he kissed Joe, it was deeply, leaving him breathless and almost dizzy. 

“We will both have to take credit then,” Joe said, around a smile, when they were still pressed so close it felt like they were sharing the same breaths.

“An excellent team effort,” Nicky said, in his driest tone. 

Joe laughed, joyfully, and playfully kissed Nicky’s answering grin. He would gladly love him for the rest of eternity no matter how many horrors he had to endure to be worthy of such a blessing. 

He kissed Nicky again and again. “We still have 40 minutes until we need to check out.”

Nicky looped his arms around Joe’s neck and returned the kiss. “Mm. Or you could let me drive and we could arrive with hours to spare.”

That was a serious dilemma. Joe would prefer that, would prefer having his time to take Nicky to pieces instead of leading him into the bedroom at the hotel. But when it came to driving, Nicky feared neither god nor man. He had never killed any of them - how Joe did not know except that they did not allow him to drive that frequently. 

“Will you remember we are not in Germany and there is actually a speed limit?” Joe asked. 

“I will get us there early,” Nicky replied, unrepentant. “I have only ever crashed on purpose.”

They had been spectacular crashes too, Joe winced even thinking of them. Nicky saw it immediately and said, blandly: “You can drive if you prefer.”

“Try to avoid speeding tickets,” Joe said, conceding. “We have given Copley enough to do over the past few weeks.”

Nicky snorted. There was one who had not earned his forgiveness or his trust yet. Still, he promised with a gravity that was pitched just so to make Joe laugh: “I will do my best.”

**Author's Note:**

> First foray in the Old Guard Fandom. I will thank these characters for breaking me out of my pandemic-based writers block. 
> 
> (If anyone is cursing me because this isn't a Kind Old Sun update, don't worry, they work up ALL my muses.)
> 
> Thank you onewordnoe for the EXCELLENT beta!
> 
> [Come say hi to me on tumblr!](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/dreamer-wisher-liar)


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